Friday, November 30, 2007

Cass R. Sunstein, professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School, will deliver the first Distinguished Lecture of the new AEI Center for Regulatory and Market Studies. His subject will be the sources of extremism. He uses recent studies of juries, federal judges, and ordinary citizens to show that groups of like-minded people often move to extreme positions on many questions, including climate change, labor policy, same-sex relations, and affirmative action. This general phenomenon – ideological amplification – helps to explain many things, including punitive damage awards, excessive and insufficient regulation, oppositional movements, political correctness, ethnic conflict, and even terrorism. He will also discuss how cost-benefit analysis, for example, can be used to solve such behavior.

Ten bucks says that this lecture will not feature criticism of Christian extremist groups in the US. I am not going to link to these dodgy cobags. I have repeatedly asked to be removed from their email address but they claim I am "not on their mailing list" despite my continued assertions that I am receiving email at multiple addresses as part of my daily responsibilities at my office. This is only part of the reason I have labeled them cobags but a large part of the reason why I was plenty eager to participate in this.